BROWN: These Sox are built to last

Monday

Oct 29, 2007 at 1:20 AM

DENVER — When it reigns, it pours.

David Brown

DENVER — When it reigns, it pours.

The Boston Red Sox, a franchise once famous for title droughts, is now compiling team-of-the-decade credentials. Capturing their second World Series title in four years on Sunday with a four-game sweep of the Colorado Rockies — a championship deluge by franchise standards — the Sox are even making a bid for team of the century.

No Major League Baseball team has won the World Series more than Boston since the end of the 1900s. And thanks to an infusion of young talent, which helped the Red Sox win their seventh crown, it stands to reason they could threaten for at least one more before the year 2100.

With rookies starting at second base and center field and a second-year lefty on the pitcher's mound, the Red Sox beat the Rockies 4-3 for their eighth consecutive victory in World Series play, the most since the Yankees won a record 14 straight from 1996-2000.

After the Red Sox took a 3-0 lead in the series on Saturday, left-fielder/franchise eccentric Manny Ramirez insisted that it was too early to celebrate.

Jon Lester, the 23 year-old who hadn't started a game since Sept. 26, was brilliant, holding Colorado scoreless for 5 2/3 innings to make Red Soxtober the most exciting month on New England's calendar until at least Patsbruary. The last-minute replacement for an injured Tim Wakefield, Lester had one of the best starts of any Red Sox pitcher in the postseason, allowing three hits and two walks with three strikeouts.

Ellsbury, the 23-year-old outfielder who was added to the lineup in Game 6 of the American League Championship Series, hit .438 against Colorado, including a 4-for-5 effort with three doubles in Game 3. Moved from the eighth slot to leadoff for the final two games of the series, Ellsbury doubled in his first at-bat on Sunday and scored on a David Ortiz double, giving Boston a 1-0 lead it would never relinquish.

Last, but don't ever call him least, was Dustin Pedroia, the other 23-year-old on the field for Boston. The Rookie of the Year candidate who homered in his first World Series at-bat was an invaluable piece of this title run. Had Pedroia failed as the Red Sox' starting second baseman and leadoff hitter, the team's season would have withered in another part of October.

With Kevin Youkilis, 28, joining him at the top of the order, Pedroia was a key contributor to an offense that didn't have to rely on Ortiz and Manny Ramirez alone, Red Sox catcher Jason Varitek said.

"That's how we've won all year," Varitek said. "Ellsbury hasn't been here (all season), but we've won with different contributors. And the big fellas are going to win their fair share of games for us, but Dustin's been such a huge part of this team all year long."

Listed generously at 5-foot-9, Pedroia is easily the shortest man on Boston's roster, but Youkilis said he refuses to consider the second baseman diminutive by any standard.

Including 26-year-old closer Jonathan Papelbon, who got five outs on Sunday to earn the save, 27-year-old ace Josh Beckett, and Game 3 winner Daisuke Matzuaka, 26, the Red Sox have established a pack of under-30 contributors that could keep them in contention for some time.

Given that Coco Crisp, 27, will likely be dealt in the offseason to make room in the outfield for Ellsbury, Boston will return three starting pitchers (Beckett, Matsuzaka and Lester), a closer, two infielders and a starting center fielder still in their twenties.

That will only buoy expectations for a fan base that has finally come to taste World Series success. As Red Sox reliever Mike Timlin explained during the ALCS, winning a championship in 2004 only made the fan base hungrier.

"The expectations are still there and it's grown since we've been here, you know since we did win (a World Series)," Timlin said. "You come to expect that. If you're eating a Hershey bar and instead of eating the whole thing, you just got a corner of it, what are you going to do? You're going to want some more."